that i'm not a normal woman. that a normal woman doesn't think about sex as much, or want it as much, and that i'm too much to handle.

so here i sit, trying to figure out what the hell is wrong with me.

Oh, my cod. Haven't got anything to add to the wisdom other Busties have posted, but I have to reiterate, there's absolutely nothing wrong with you. Stereotypes about "normal" women wanting little or no sex are so fucked up. These are not stupid things you're getting upset about. It's entirely reasonable to want our sexual partners to help us feel desirable. To not just cherish, but honor our sexuality. (By "honor" I don't mean put it on a pedestal, but just -- our sexuality is worthy of being treated as something of value, something treated with respect, even admiration. Treated as valid and legitimate and normal should be the bare minimum.)

Just have to respond because I have been in your exact shoes. I am way more sexual than my bf and always have been until I got on this damn BC pill that KILLED my sex drive. Anyways before that happened my sex drive was so much higher than his. He pretty much never cared if we had sex or not and it made me feel like it was my fault- like I wasn't able to be attractive to him or something. As you may have seen from this board I totally have body issues too...really bad ones, so it made me feel absolutely horrible. Like what man doesn't want to have sex?? He actually called me a sex addict on one occasion just because I like having sex and think its important. A sex addict! I have come to the conclusion that all this talk about men's sex drive being so much higher than ours and such is utter bullshit. When I was not on this pill and was my normal self, I thought about sex and wanted sex much more than my bf ever has. It hurt my feelings a lot that he did not reciprocate these feelings. But one day we had a talk and he just said that his sex drive is literally just low, and that he had always been that way with every girl he'd been with before me. I questioned his sexuality and asked if he just wasn't attracted to women, and he definitely said that wasn't true (I still ask him that question a lot even though he in no way seems like a gay man). I've tried to accept that maybe he just actually has a low sex drive, that maybe men like this do exist! Is it possible that this is the same with your men? There is nothing wrong with us, we just like sex! I think we have been fed this myth our whole lives that men are more into sex. All of my girlfriends are also much more into sex than their guys seem to be. It can't be that we are all unattractive, it has to be a problem with them! Maybe they have testosterone deficiencies or maybe we are just too hot too handle! You are a gorgeous woman with a great personality- I don't have to know you to know that. I've gotten down on myself about this too but please don't let yourself think it's you.

Damona, reading your post, I was struck by the idea that there are two things going on: how you feel about your sexuality and how your guys respond to you. They overlap for sure, but they're not the same thing.

I can understand why you doubt that being highly sexual is a good thing, given past and current responses (those 'normal woman' comments can be thrown out of the window IMO) but it is something to be celebrated. 'Too much to handle' often means too much for them to handle, so you can dismiss what sounds like bullshit. It sounds like both guys, current situation notwithstanding, have revelled in your sexuality. It's a great thing, something to feel good about.

You do sound like you're very invested in how both guys respond to you, and take it as a reflection on you/your sexuality when they choose not to have sex with you, which then makes your self-esteem go way down. I went through this years ago, where I was way more interested in sex than my guy, and I was alternately hurt and frustrated by his lack of response, so I know to an extent how you feel--but I also learned that linking how I felt about myself to how badly my guy wanted me made me too vulnerable and gave him too much power. I mean, we're all human; of course we take someone saying no personally--especially if you've put yourself out there. I guess I'm just trying to say that it's not a judgement about you, or it doesn't sound that way.

Saying that, it also sounds, like ketto indicated, that they've both gotten into patterns of taking you for granted, and I agree with her that your Mr talking like this about other women is problematic--especially if he's not that into sex overall! But it also sounds like when do you have sex with him you're really connected. It is great you can talk to the Boy openly too. If he's having health issues that are getting in the way of you two having sex, he may feel more self-conscious than he wants to let on about them, especially if he's a bit of a young'un.

I don't have any answers, really, just my thoughts on what you wrote. Keep posting about this if it helps (((damona)))

Damona, it almost sounds like they're more emotionally detached when it comes to sex. I think you acknowledge that you have some issues but you also sound like you want both of them to show their desire for you more.

QUOTE

he also talks about other girls, what it might be like to have sex with them, what he thinks they would look like naked, etc. he has a lot of female friends and he flirts with all of them, constantly. i know there's nothing going on, but, really... sometimes it's a bit hard to take.

Personally, I would probably feel hurt too if my partner said things like this, especially when it sounds like you're wanting more attention, at least verbally. The fact that he's so disinterested in sex and then goes and talks about other women made me wonder if maybe he's just at a point where he's taking you for granted a bit. It doesn't sound like he talks about you the same way he talks about these other women, and that coupled with telling you he doesn't want to have sex very often probably feels painful.

With both of your partners it sounds like you view their attitudes towards sex with you as if they're doing you a favour. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I would guess you just want both of them to make you feel like a sexy, desirable woman. It sounds like it's become too much about sex and not enough about you and the act of being together in that kind of intimacy. For your partners, has sex and masturbation become mutual? That's the impression I'm getting and I think that's problematic because then it's less about the two of you being together and more about just getting off.

dragging this thread out of the dust... seems to be the best place for this. oh, how i hope this post doesn't come back to bite me in the ass, but i have got to get some of this off my mind. fair warning, it's probably going to be very long.

so.

i am a very, very sexual person. i always have been. i love sex, in all it's many forms. i think about sex a LOT and would be perfectly happy if i could have sex at least 3 times a day. minimum. i don't always orgasm (it took me years to learn to orgasm with a partner and it still doesn't always happen) but even so, it just feels so damn good! i like to think i'm pretty down to earth and accepting about pretty much everything sexually, but i've still got some issues (don't we all, tho? in some form?) i'm also a survivor, which i'm sure hasn't helped with some of those issues, and has probably actively caused some of them.

i'm basically living in a triad right now with my husband and my boyfriend (The Mr and The Boy). The Boy doesn't actually live with us, but he's literally just around the corner, so i see him every day. The Mr and i have been together for 14 years now, and The Boy and i for 2 years. i can honestly say that i'm in love with both of them. the guys are good friends, my kids like The Boy, it's all above board and i'm really pretty happy.

but.

i feel like it's not enough, sexually. and then i feel guilty for thinking that. The Mr has always had a pretty low sex drive. he's said right out that he'd be fine with having sex about once a month, maybe every six weeks. i cannot live with that. it's part of why we ended up having an open relationship (his suggestion, not mine, btw). we've had a lot of problems in the past, and we've worked out some of them, but his incredibly low sex drive has always been a big issue. i once was on my knees in front of him, unzipping his pants, and he said "i'm trying to watch this show, stop that." one of the problems is that he prefers to masturbate, which leaves me feeling well, rather put out, honestly. no, i don't have a problem with masturbation, i never have, it's that he prefers that over having actual sex with living, breathing, practically begging, me!

we've pretty much settled into an at least once every 2 weeks thing, which i can deal with, though i'm not really happy about. when we do have sex, it's really great. he's one of the few people that i have ever been able to truly relax enough with to orgasm at all, let alone during actual intercourse, and it is amazing. sometimes he'll finger me or go down until i cum (he's never quite understood that, for me, it's not all about the orgasm, but i'm not going to bitch if i'm getting some lol) and then that's enough for him. it's like he has no real interest in it. like he's just humoring me. i think he's actually thinking "well, if i do this, then maybe she'll leave me alone for another week or so."

he also talks about other girls, what it might be like to have sex with them, what he thinks they would look like naked, etc. he has a lot of female friends and he flirts with all of them, constantly. i know there's nothing going on, but, really... sometimes it's a bit hard to take.

needless to say, this has left me with some of the afore mentioned issues. let's start with the obvious... i do not look like any porn actress i've ever seen (and both guys watch a lot of porn) and i have a lot of body issues. i'm comfortable in my own skin until i think about it too much, if that makes sense, and then... my tummy is squishy and i have a c-section scar and my ass is too big and my boobs are kind of droopy after nursing 4 babies and i have some spider veins on my thighs, which are too big and squishy anyway, and... you get the idea. i'm awfully good at tearing myself apart until i feel like i'm too ugly to be allowed out in public. i'm a big girl anyway, though i do still have the classic hourglass shape, it's just, um, large. i've lost 35 pounds recently, which has helped me feel better about myself, until i went to the dr and he told me to lose another 95 pounds, which, imo, would leave me looking positively skeletal. but that's a whole different thread.

another issue is that i get upset about when my guys masturbate. not upset like "how dare you" but just... shit. i don't know how to explain it. i feel like i can't complain because i do it too, just about every day and hey, it's a natural part of life, but it bothers me on some deep level because i am right here, ready and willing, just about any time and yet... hell. i really don't know how to explain the way it makes me feel. i dislike being ditched for a cheesy video and their hand, i guess. it makes me feel like i'm not good enough, not sexy enough, like i'm not what they really want... i do not have the right words for this discussion *sigh* i have been trying to deal with this issue and not let it spill over but it kind of has recently. which brings me to...

The Boy. he's quite a bit younger than i am. like 10 years younger. i've known him since he was 12, but not in a creepy "i'm waiting for you to grow up" sort of way. he was just one of those kids that hung out at my house cuz he was friends with my sister. he moved in here at the complex when he was 17, he started babysitting for me, we got to be buddies, then he 'fessed up that he'd liked me for a long time, and suddenly, i was looking at him a little differently... i did not touch him until after he was 18, however. i'm not that dumb. the sexual sparks between us could have started a bonfire in a heartbeat, once i let myself acknowledge that i had those feelings for him but i stayed strictly away from him in that way until he was legal. i even refused to go to his place b/c i didn't want our friendship to be misconstrued by anyone. we hooked up a couple of months after he turned 18, and have been together ever since. i never meant to fall in love with him, but i did. full on, head over heels. fortunately, he returns those feelings.

sex with him is fantastic. truly. i can honestly say that i've done things with him that i've never done with anyone else. i trust him like i trust no one else but The Mr and my BGP. in the beginning, we couldn't keep our hands off of each other. i know that things change after awhile and settle down, the bonfire becomes a nice cozy hearth fire and all that, but as i've said, i am a very sexual person. i still want to have sex with him at least once a day (with The Mr as well, but we've come to a basic agreement about that). until the last few months, we had sex at least once a day and it was great. i was happy about it and content and all the good things. recently, he's been not as interested and i have to admit, i was taking it kind of personally. i'm so glad now that we did hold off on starting a sexual relationship, because we got to be such close friends that we're comfortable talking about these things, and we have talked a couple times. he has some health issues that are becoming interfering, and i understand that.

this past weekend, i went over by him on saturday morning, we fooled around a bit (no sex), then i had to leave and he promised we'd pick up where we'd left off, later. when i went over later, his door was locked and i teased him, asking if he'd been pleasing himself. he said yes, he just had. all of a sudden, i felt like shit. like i was not important at all, like he didn't really want me, he was starting to prefer jerking off to being with me... i kind of went off (entirely in my head) on a tangent. i couldn't understand why he would do that, when i'd been looking forward to our evening for the whole damn day, and was so worked up i could hardly stand it. and yet, he was done. finished. took care of it himself. i wanted to cry. as it turned out, the whole thing was kind of a moot point, anyway, since i went to the bathroom a little later and discovered i had started my period, which i'm sure had at least a little to do with my mood and attitude about the whole thing.

so tonight, i asked him (well, blurted out is more like it) if i was too sexual, if i was too much for him, like i am for The Mr. (i've been told by both a guy and 2 girls before that i'm too masculine in my sexual attitudes and that i'm not a normal woman. that a normal woman doesn't think about sex as much, or want it as much, and that i'm too much to handle. needless to say, that has stuck with me, too.) we ended up talking about what happened on saturday and he said that he just "felt like doing it" so he did. which, ok, i guess, not really a big deal, i know he usually does it several times a day anyway, it just happened to be poor timing that day. he told me that i'm not too much, that he wants it all the time, too, but that his health issues make sex uncomfortable at times, which is why he doesn't want to do it as much as we used to. which he's said before and i really do understand that. then he said, "even if i didn't feel like it anymore i was still going to because i'd promised you i would." can i just say "ouch"? that made me feel like i'm a burden, a duty, something he has to deal with... and it hurt. a lot.

we talked a little more and i tried to explain a little bit to him about how living with The Mr all these years has left me with some of these issues, but it didn't really go very well. when i mentioned about how i feel rather inadequate, physically, in comparison to the porn actresses, he ended up showing me pictures of the porn stars that he likes that remind him of me. which is sort of a back-handed compliment, i guess. he showed me his current favourite movie (of course, the actress is 5'1" and about 100 pounds. very helpful for my self-image), then said he wanted a blow job while watching a blow job. then he said he really wasn't in the mood and he'd walk me home. i have little doubt that he went home and finished watching the movie and took care of himself.

so here i sit, trying to figure out what the hell is wrong with me. why am i like this? why do i get upset about stupid things? why am i so ridiculously sexual? and why don't either of the guys i love, who both say that they love me and think i am beautiful, actually want to have sex with me? why am i taking it so personally? why can't i just let it roll off and say "oh, well, there's always tomorrow"? i try to do that, i really do, but i'm really starting to feel like there is something wrong with me. am i too open about my sexuality? am i doing something wrong? am i not attractive enough anymore? what the hell is going on? i feel like i'm going to cry again. i hate that they've both made me doubt myself like this but i just don't know what to do about it.

Well, it was from the LATimes. California ain't nothin' but a bunch o' deviants.

Jsmith, you're fine. There are great variances in vaginal lubrication, I would say that mine is a mixture of the viscous & the more liquid-y variety. Depending upon where you are in your cycle, your diet, any medications you may be taking, level of arousal, etc, your Britney can switch things up on you: odor, texture, taste, color, etc. If it smelled bad or drastically changed appearance I'd get thee to the gyno, but it sounds like you are most likely a-okay in your nethers.

--------------------

"You're cute, like a velvet glove cast in iron. And like a gas chamber, a real fun gal."

AP, I noticed that the study didn't mention the use (or lack thereof) of condoms during anal sex by these research participants. I agree with you that condoms should be used during anal sex. I guess this article just isn't clear and appears one sided in its attempts to be noteworthy about the increased risk with HIV. I'm sure there are other variables that need to be listed in order for that title to be accurate, such as barebacking and using lube during anal sex. Then again, I'm assuming the public who may read this article is liberal in its understanding of sex like us. Shame on me.

jsmith, I've never had that happen to me. Not sure what that fluid is all about. Sorry.

Okay, so.. We were together again last night, and we used a condom, of course. It did not break, but still, when I stood up afterwards, this torrent of watery fluid came out. What was that all about? It didn't happen the first time...

ETA: I always thought that natural lube was thick, not watery. But am I mistaken?

--------------------

Shake off all the fears of servile prejudices, under which weak minds are serviley crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call on her tribunal for every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God, because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blind faith. — Thomas Jefferson

Huh. Just when we were having a lube positive exchange, the LA Times prints that lube may increase disease risk during anal. I don't know about anybody else, but, uh, condoms 100% during anal. Even with a good couple of douchings, I still think condoms are a good idea for anal for a variety of reasons.

--------------------

"You're cute, like a velvet glove cast in iron. And like a gas chamber, a real fun gal."

I like Babeland's water-based Babelube. The new formula is even better than the old & I always keep a sachet or two in my handbag. I like it because I find it to be a good multi-purpose lube (good vaginally, anally, & with all toys), it's pretty much tasteless, & a little goes a loooong way. It isn't sticky or tacky. Their higher end brand Entice is really nice, too. I've never used their organics or their flavored versions because I'm not worried about organics & I think dick should taste like dick.

I *can* say I am not a fan of silicone lubes.

Lube can be confusing. It all depends upon your needs. Do you want organic, gluten free, water-based, silicone, etc, etc, etc. I suggest looking around on various toy sites & seeing what's available, reading ingredients & looking at reviews. The archives here are also helpful, although I did piss some people off back in 2008 & shit got kinda intense.

Just stay the fuck away from KY, it's cheap, shitty & all around bad news for your puss. You only have one Britney, you shouldn't skimp out on her. Drugstore brands are largely shite, but I do know mine does carry some good stuff like Gun Oil.

--------------------

"You're cute, like a velvet glove cast in iron. And like a gas chamber, a real fun gal."

LOL re: KY. He was the one who bought the materials, and he didn't know what to really get, so he picked up KY. I actually had bought equate, because I used that when I was first starting with the cup, and it worked beautifully. But all went well. It was certainly a tight squeeze, but not what I would deem painful. Startling, but not painful.

AP, what brand would you recommend btw?

--------------------

Shake off all the fears of servile prejudices, under which weak minds are serviley crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call on her tribunal for every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God, because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blind faith. — Thomas Jefferson

kudos API agree with all of that. One thought though- lubricant- even for sensitive skin types can cause problems- I can't seem to use any. So I would be careful with that. Human lubricant is better. Enjoy the moments, enjoy your partner.

You might want to be on top since that way you control the penetration. But first & foremost, listen to Frankie: RELAX! And to quote Dr. Ruth, "EN-JOY IT!"

*Do not cheap out on the lubricant (Read: NO KY). Read the ingredients. Do not buy anything with glycerin. Glycerin = sugar = yeast. Sweet almond oil can be nice but is not for use with condoms. And I am not gonna lecture you on condom usage because I know you're smart enough to use them if your partner is a non-virgin & hasn't been tested recently.

--------------------

"You're cute, like a velvet glove cast in iron. And like a gas chamber, a real fun gal."

Ok. Gals..I'm a virgin. Won't be by tomorrow's close..I'm not especially worried about pain (I use a cup, so I think I'll be at least a little bit stretched).. but I guess it's a possibility.Is there anything, anything at all, that I should know? I really don't know what to expect, as far as my reaction will go.So if there's anything you all can tell me, please do so.

--------------------

Shake off all the fears of servile prejudices, under which weak minds are serviley crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call on her tribunal for every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God, because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blind faith. — Thomas Jefferson